


College Experimentation

by Triskellion



Series: Consultant Verse [2]
Category: Smallville
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-31
Updated: 2012-10-31
Packaged: 2017-11-17 10:35:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/550634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Triskellion/pseuds/Triskellion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A oneshot in the same world as "Who Am I?" Clark has just finished his freshman year at Met U, but he has one more task before all is right in the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	College Experimentation

“Lex, what are you doing here?”

Alexander Joseph Luthor, sicon of the Luthor name, heir to LuthorCorp, CEO of LexCorp, somehow managed to look regal while sprawling on a dorm bed, surrounded by dirty laundry and textbooks, wearing jeans.

Clark Kent was trying not to drool.

Hugh didn’t bother, jumping up on the bed the instant Clark unsnapped his leash and providing a thorough tongue bath to Lex’s face.

“Ehach, stop that, Hugh,” Lex protested, laughing as he shoved the graying lab mix companion dog away.

Clark came forward and lifted Hugh away, tucking the happily wriggling dog under one arm. “Sorry about that. He’s been slipping his training of late. And he likes you.”

“And I like him,” Lex said, reaching up to rub Hugh between the ears. “Though if he starts doing that in public we will have words.” 

“No, he still obeys when he’s on leash,” Clark said with a chuckle, “and I don’t let him off at public functions. I have enough trouble with my teachers accepting him as it is.”

“Good to know.” Lex paused and frowned. “I thought you dealt with that after the first semester?”

Clark grinned. “I did.” He pointed at the stack of manila envelopes on the corner of his desk. “After three complaints in the first semester, the Ombudsman’s Office put that packet together for me to just hand complaining professors and students. Includes laws regarding companion dogs, copies of school policy, and any other paperwork they could think of to make it clear no one has the right to complain. Though I think Professor Silver was just jealous and wished she could have made a fuss over Hugh while he was working.”

Lex’s gray eyes seemed to glow silver as he smiled at the story.

“Though, since Dr. Bradshaw specified I should keep a companion dog until my expected graduation date from high school, Hugh gets to retire this summer. I think Dad’s looking forward to having him around full time.” It would be good for Hugh to have a chance to relax and just be a farm dog, but Clark was going to miss him.

“Has it already been so long?”

Clark rolled his eyes. He knew that teasing tone. And he knew that Lex was just as aware of how long it had been since his breakdown as he was.

“Yes, well, you’ve done so well for yourself since then.”

“True.” Clark grinned. He’d just come back from his last final of his first year of college. “They won’t give me the paperwork until I finish my bachelors, but I have enough classes for a masters in math now.”

Lex shook his head. “You should have attended a more prestigious school, one that would have understood your needs better. It’s not like half the Ivy League schools weren’t courting you. And you have the money.”

“You made sure of that.” Clark punched Lex lightly on the shoulder.

“You earned every penny.”

“I didn’t want to go that far. At Met U I don’t have to lie about swinging home to the farm weekends.” And it’s easy to visit Lex, especially since he was mostly running LexCorp from Metropolis these days. “And they have the classes I want.”

“There are still teachers and opportunities you are missing out on.”

Clark raised an eyebrow. “Somehow I have trouble believing that. Or are you really going to try to convince me it’s a surprise to you that some of the best minds in math and science are vying to schedule sabbaticals in Metropolis sometime soon.”

Lex smirked. “I might have offered to fund a few grants. Just to get some better consultants for a few LexCorp projects of course.”

“Of course.” Lex was still protecting Clark, and trying to give him the best money could buy. And honestly, it was working. Clark felt his heart surge every time Lex slipped something like this past. “However, you still haven’t explained what you’re doing in my dorm room.”

“I haven’t?” Lex pushed himself to his feet. “How remiss of me. Well, now that you’re done with your first year of college, and legally eighteen, I might have informed your parents I wasn’t taking no for an answer and I was taking you for a vacation.” 

Clark’s heart skipped a beat, then he frowned. “Now?” He looked around his room, taking in the laundry that was way past needing doing, the books and notes scattered everywhere. It would have been worse if he’d had a roommate, something he’d mysteriously not needed to consider, but he still had a lot of straightening and packing to do before he could head home.

“Now,” Lex said firmly. “I have a team scheduled to come by this evening. They’ll pack you up and ship everything to the farm. You can sort clean from dirty when you get back.”

“Lex, I can’t—“

Lex covered Clark’s mouth with one pale hand. “Ah, yes you can. I’ve already cleared it with your parents.”

Clark frowned. He was surprised by that. He’d made it clear to his parents that he intended to tell Lex what he was after this semester, and that he wanted to show Lex the ship as soon as they got home. There weren’t any lies between them anymore, not really, but there were also a few unspoken details still to express.

“And they gave me this and said you’d explain when you were ready.” Lex’s hand slipped out of his jean pocket, holding a metallic octagon. 

Clark’s heart pounded. “Lex….”

Lex flipped the ship’s key up to a two fingered grip and rotated it for study. “I’d love to know how you got ahold of this again, and if you know how it got out of my office….” He caught Clark’s hand and dropped the key in his palm, wrapping his fingers around the metal. Lex looked into Clark’s eyes. “But I can wait. For now, we have a plane to catch.”

~o0o~

Spring break on Lex’s dime had been interesting, but summer vacation with Lex was much better. And not just because the resort in the Grand Caymans was twelve times as luxurious and privileged as the hotel and club passes from Miami. No, this time Lex had spent the full day with Clark and promised an absolute minimum of work for the full two weeks (there was always a chance that a business acquaintance would arrive and something would come up, but no plans had been made, no meetings arranged in advance). 

“Sun, booze, and women,” Lex had proclaimed when they stepped off the airplane in the warm sea breeze. 

“Sun, booze, and Lex,” Clark had countered in his head. And he was going to manage to say that aloud at some point before this trip was over.

Dinner was exquisite, and when the first serving hadn’t been enough (not that Clark had been starving himself during finals or anything, he’d just been too busy to eat a few times), Lex had ordered a second round without batting an eye. Then he’d suggested clubbing, but Clark had talked him into going back to their room. Or rather, their suite. Not that anyone really needed three bedrooms, four bathrooms, a sitting room, and living room, a music room… yeah, rather over the top.

Clark waited until, they were curled up in the sitting room with drinks before he pulled the key out of his pocket.

“I’m surprised my parents agreed to this, money aside,” he said, trying to sound calm even as his fingers dug into Hugh’s fur, his companion dog curled up on the couch at his side. “I’d told them I wanted to discuss this with you, at the farm…. To tell you….”

Lex leaned forward in his chair, his elbows on the ends of the high arms encircling him. “They mentioned that, and I told them the where didn’t matter, or the when.”

“Maybe not,” Clark said softly, studying the glint of the light off the metal. “But I’ve never gotten up the courage to try and use this, and I was hoping you’d give me the push I need.”

“Use this? You know what it’s for?” Lex’s eyes lit up with curiosity.

“Maybe,” Clark hedged, which was completely true. “I never did thank you for finding it, not that I knew it was missing…” He closed his eyes and gave himself a mental smack on the head. He was screwing this up.

“Maybe start from the beginning?” Lex suggested.

“The beginning? There are a lot of possible beginnings. But I guess, to me, it began the day you hit me with your car.”

Lex gasped. No matter how many times Clark was honest about that one thing, it always seemed to hit Lex on an emotional level.

“I confronted Dad. I mean, I should have died. Sure I was strong, fast, but nothing previous had hinted… And he offered me two utterly useless hunks of metal and a story. The story of how the found me, or I found them, in a field during the meteor shower, and I led them back to my space ship.” Clark looked up through his eyelashes, not able to meet Lex’s eyes but dying to know his friend’s reaction.

Lex was calculating, eyes flickering an expression fixed in a Luthor mask. Not quite what Clark had hoped for.

“I think this is the key to my ship. We keep it in the storm cellar on the farm, dumb as that is. You’d think we’d have learned better since Nixon found it there. I think he stole this from you”—Clark tossed the key and caught it—“and put it into the ship the night of the twisters. But it shook out again during the storm. Pete found the ship, but not the key.”

“Pete knows?” Lex sounded a bit plaintive.

“It was tell him or watch him turn the whole thing over to the media.” Clark winced at the thought. “I was terrified… and he didn’t take it well. Until Hamilton kidnapped him. Then he got it. Of course, he could accept that, but not that I was holding back on my school work.”

“I had wondered what happened… you two seemed to having a falling out.”

“I refused to help him cheat,” Clark said flatly, darkly. Hugh shoved his cold, wet nose into Clark’s side, and he turned to pet the dog that sought to comfort him. “It was… a relief when he left Smallville.”

Clark let those words linger in the air, keeping his eyes and attention on Hugh and letting Lex… decide.

It was a long, painful wait before Lex finally asked, “Why now?” 

Clark took a deep breath, and finally looked up. Lex’s fingers were white where they gripped his drink, the other hand balled tight at his side. There were so many what ifs, why nots, maybes, could bes, and wanna bes wrapped up in those two words, all of them shining from his eyes.

“Because I was hoping you’d want to be by my side when I tried putting this in my ship.” Clark held up the key again. “And maybe the caves too. I don’t … because while I wasn’t lying anymore, I didn’t want assumptions between us anymore. Because I’m finally breaking free of the fear my parents raised me with, fear of other finding out about me, of landing in a lab as a real alien autopsy—“

A cry of pain broke free of Lex. He dropped his glass, spilling scotch and ice across the carpet, then launched himself to Clark’s side.

“I would never… will never allow… You know I’ll protect you. Don’t you?”

Clark cupped Lex’s cheek, unable to resist now that it was so close. “I know. I’ve known for a long time. I had to get to the point where I could even say it. I think the best I could do with Pete was say ‘I’m not from around here.’ It’s hard to go from extraordinary human to—“

“Amazing. Beautiful. Intelligent,” Lex said. Then grinned with utter excitement. “And proof that comic books are getting it right. My own personal Warrior Angel.”

“You’re the one who’s bald, not me,” Clark said, running his fingers across the smooth skin above Lex’s left ear. Lex shuddered, his eyes fluttering closed for a moment before he opened them again with an intense stare.

“I’m wondering if there was another factor to the timing,” Lex breathed in a tone that went straight through Clark with a curl of pleasure.

“I might have done some experimenting this year, had a few realizations this spring,” Clark whispered, his face moving closer to Lex’s. Or maybe Lex’s was moving closer to Clark’s. “I wanted you to know the whole truth before…”

“Before?” Lex’s breath slithered across Clark’s lips.

“Before I told you I realized I really wanted to kiss you when I watched you eat fondue, to get as close to you as that dancer at the club, to maybe try a few of those things I wouldn’t let anyone else do when I tried dating this year…”

Lex cupped Clark’s cheeks with both hands. “I thought you’d never ask.” And Clark felt the press of Lex’s lips to his.

_Finally._

Perfection.

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, I had to figure out a way to make this universe Clex. I did. And I have done so. I have a few ideas for a few more shorts and one shots, so keep an eye out. They'll bounce through time and events. Assume a lot of cannon is shot and gone and forgotten at this point. I'll bring up bits if I feel necessary, but otherwise assume most of it hasn't happened.
> 
> Hope you enjoyed.


End file.
